Parenting

I know women are exempt from time-bound commandments in part because of the need to provide childcare. But what about a man who is the primary caregiver for his children? My situation is that I am a stay-at-home dad and I probably will be for many years to come. My wife has a very demanding job where she is away from home for as many as 14 hours a day. After having our first baby recently, she had some maternity leave and this freed me up some time to do things including davening. Now she is back at work and except on weekends, I find davening at the proper time practically impossible. Childcare is much more of a responsibility than I ever imagined. It’s much harder work than the full time job I had before our daughter was born. Even before we conceived, my wife wanted me to quit my job to be a stay-at-home dad as soon as we had children. She made it clear to me that she prefers work to childcare, and I love children, so it is a good arrangement. I gave my notice two months before the baby was born and stopped working six weeks before her birth. I’m glad I did because I was so busy preparing for fatherhood even before she was born. Now that I am my daughter’s primary caregiver, I literally have no free time except maybe a little on weekends. This is just the beginning. We want to have more children in the future. This puts me in the position of being primary caregiver of the children for decades to come. I will always be the one who feeds them, changes their diapers, does the laundry and housework, and takes them where they need to go. Which means I can’t see myself being able to daven at the proper time as hard as I might try. I do very much love what I am doing, but I am feeling guilty about not davening.

I know according to the Torah, we are supposed to obey our parents. But does that mean that if they do not want to have a relationship with us, we are required to respect that wish and not ever contact them? I am adopted. My adoptive parents gave me a very nice upbringing. But they have both died. I did a DNA test earlier this year. My biological mother was not on it, but I found a biological cousin. My cousin wasn’t very welcoming but told me who my biological mother is and gave me her phone number but warned me that she would not warm up to me. I called my biological mother. As my cousin told me to expect, my biological mother was rude to me. She spoke for under two minutes in which she admitted she had me and gave me up and said that’s how she wanted it to be. She acted like I violated her by calling her as a stranger. And before slamming the phone, she told me never to call her again.

From before the time I was born, my father was a very observant religious man. He put on tefillin every day, went to shul regularly, studied Torah, and taught me to be who I am now. He was very kind and scrupulously observed every mitzvah he possibly could. Sadly, my father now has dementia. This has affected his personality. Today, my father rails against the very religious principles he once practiced. And he uses a lot of profanity in reference to the beliefs his demented mind has taken on. He says the most terrible things about G-d, the Torah, and Halacha. Anyone observing Jew would be disgusted by what he’s saying. And he has stopped practicing too. During Shabbos, he turns lights on and off, watches TV, and makes phone calls. We have tried, but we can’t control him. He can be quite combative. If he was still driving, he’d be driving on Shabbos too. If he had access to food of his choice, he’d be eating treif. My father now lives with us because he can no longer live by himself. We have hired part-time care for him so we can have our lives and our sanity. We like to have Shabbos guests. But when we have people over, we can’t stop him from behaving like this at the Shabbos table. Some of our friends understand the nature of his condition, but others cannot comprehend what’s really going on and think he is just a self-hating Jew. They do not realize what he was like in the past before he developed this irreversible condition. We like having Shabbos guests over, but we find him an embarrassment. We don’t want to turn away anyone from our home. And we don’t want to exclude him either. How do you think we should manage this?

Dear Rabbi, My husband and I are in our upper 50s. We have been happily married for over 30 years. We tried but couldn’t have children when we were young and couldn’t adopt either because we couldn’t afford to. We have always felt and still feel an emptiness because we never had any children. This emptiness has grown as more time has passed and many of our relatives are gone. Now we are financially in a better position and we would very much love to adopt some children, but we cannot ignore the fact that we are older. We are for the most part in good health. We have asked a lawyer, and legally we can adopt if an agency is willing to approve us. What is your advice as a rabbi when it comes to middle-aged people adopting children?    

Does one who fails to conceive children naturally, despite their best attempts, fulfill the mitzvah to be fruitful and multiply if they adopt children and raise a family of one or more adopted children?

I have a 9-month-old son from a previous relationship with a non-Jewish woman. She voluntarily relinquished custody and I am raising him as a single father. I am now in a relationship with a Jewish woman I am hoping to marry someday. She is interested in becoming religiously observant someday and is hoping to bring me in that direction too if we get married. I am strongly considering it myself, but it’ll be a long road. I grew up as the only Jew in my neighborhood, had almost no exposure to Jewish life, and I know almost nothing. Is there any way I can convert my son to Judaism? Can I get him circumcised? Can I educate him in Judaism? Can I take these steps when he is young, or do I have to wait until he grows up and let him make his own choice?

Dear Rabbi, My child recently came home from school and complained that some classmates are picking on him. He doesn’t want to tattle on them to the teacher because this could cause the classmates to pick on him even more. Rabbi, please advise me on the “Jewish way” to help him. Thank you!

We have a grown, married son who has a penchant for friendship with women while he eschews socialization with men. This disturbed us as he was growing up. We tried back then to steer him toward activities with boys, but he showed no interest. Instead, he enjoyed traditionally feminine hobbies and hanging out with girls. We talked to a psychologist back then who said it was his personality and to let him be. We always thought he would grow out of it. Now he is an adult who lives on his own. He has built for himself a life in which he spends most of his awake hours around women, both professionally and recreational. This has been going on for many years now. All the women he hangs around enjoy his company, even as he is the only man surrounded by dozens of women. They like him because of his charming, delightful personality, kindness toward women, and gregarious nature. A few years ago, he married a fine Jewish woman. We were so overjoyed. We thought that might solve this problem. Instead his wife has helped his cause and finds it endearing that he likes women so much. He is very faithful to her. He just enjoys women for friendship. And with his wife’s blessing, he continues to hang around women and even spends one-on-one time with some female friends. We think it is extremely inappropriate the way he lives. What do you think we as parents can do aside from talking to him directly or consulting with a rabbi around here, since he will not listen to either on this matter?

Hello Rabbi, My wife and I are having a bit of a disagreement. I don’t know what right thing to do. My question is this, at what age can I take my daughter to visit her grandfathers gravesite? A little background. I was born in Russia. I moved to America when I was 5. Most Russia Jews are not very religious but share a lot of values and traditions. One thing I was raised to believe is that you don’t take children with living parents to cemeteries, unless the children is old enough or married. The issue is my wife’s father passed 6 months ago and my wife is only 25. She’s having a hard time with the passing. Now after 6 months my daughter who is 7 years old is starting to get sad and cry at random time, when we ask her what’s wrong she says that she misses grandpa. My wife thinks it will help and stop our daughter from having those moments of sadness/crying. I growing up not bring kids to cemeteries and very uncomfortable with this idea. Plus I think this will not help, may actually make it worse. I think we should find other ways to handling / deal with those moments. I would love some advice and guidance in this matter. thank you